To ask what you're doing in advance of gas/elec rises in April?

[irritablehead1]

I feel like I wade through treacle when i try to work out how to try and minimise rise of the gas/elec in April.

Can anyone offer a short cut through all the advise and pretty much tell me what I should be doing to cut the impact?

I fixed with a new supplier a few months ago but I've just had a bill saying we are £500+ in gas debt and so our payments will be going up every month. Annoying because I do everything already to minimise costs.

I have been doing most of the things on this thread for a while to try and keep usage down, I'm not sure I've got anything left to save on without really feeling it and it being just bloody miserable.

Couple of things not mentioned are that I have the heating on in 2 goes in the evening, set from half an hour before I get in for 2 hours, then off for 2 hours, then back on for an hour to warm up before bed, I noticed a difference cutting that 2 hours out and I tend to cook/do housework in that 2 hours so I don't feel it as much. I have it on for 45 mins in the morning so it's warm when I get up and for a little while and I use all the warmth created as it cools down before I leave as I'm getting ready. I also adjust the heating daily to what I'm going to be doing so it's on for the bare minimum.
If I'm watching TV then no lights on and have battery string lights in hallway that go on at night to see your way to the bathroom and back.

I also have rigged up a shower over the bath with one of those things you put over the taps, as we don't have a shower and saw a difference not having so many baths.

Nmw is going up in April, but I'm expecting to use the extra on NI increase and the increase in fuel and food prices, and maybe extra too. Hopefully it will 'break even' as in the extra from the nmw rise will cover the extra in costs.
I'll also continue to put the amount on the gas and electric pre payment as I am now, through summer to build up a buffer, I did it last year and although it's going down I have a small buffer before I get into the emergency from lower usage in summer.

Lots of layers, ie a vest, jumper & cardigan. In the evening a hot water bottle & blanket to watch tv. Heating only goes on when I’m up but I wear leggings & jumper under my dressing gown till it’s warm. Heating on in morning & then off till kids come home. I’m buying cheaper food & cut back on wine. I’m just being really careful, trying to cut back on petrol by driving slower & thinking hard before buying anything non essential. Definitely won’t be able to afford a holiday this year if energy prices go up.

I've taken a pro active approach.

Fiat I realised I had an open chimney still in the living room with a gas fire. I blocked the chimney with a "Chimney Sheep" I noticed a difference immediately and replaced the gas fire with an electric one as the chimney was now closed off. It's brilliant.

I lined all my walls that are adjacent to outside walls with "Wallrock Thermal Liner" then painted it, really hard to tell the walls are just not plastered and painted now.

I have all new doors and windows no drafts there and bought "thermal perfect fit blinds" for all my windows.

I also swapped as soon as I heard prices were going up, so I was lucky there got a 3 year fixed with Scottish Power before the huge hikes.

@lightand

We bought one of those gizmos which tell us what each of our applicance uses.

Our old chest freezer was the biggest culprit in usage. It is on for 20 hours out of each 24. Dreadful. It has a dodgy lid.

2nd biggest culprit - we have a 2kw heater in the "airing cupboard". Dawned on us that I only need it on max 3 days out of 7.

Will be hanging up washing outdoors more, like others.

Oh, and DH and I have two computers on, day and night. Need to tackle that too. But to be fair, we are both on them for several hours each day.

Trouble is with electricity, it is pennies spent here, and pennies spent there. Which all add up over the space of a year.

You could try, like I have read others have done, literally turn off all electricity all over the house. And you may soon see what is very important, and what is not so important. Or you can find ways around. A bit.

Good luck.

we bought one of those plugs too. We have a Miele dryer as I thought if we really save and get a good one we don’t need to worry about the cost. Plugged it into magic plug and it was £5.08 PER DRYING CYCLE! I panicked and cleaned out all the filters (usually done every couple of cycles anyway) and the next load was 37.5p! So cleaning out the filters made a massive difference! The heated throws are also cheap according to my magic plug.

Me and dh grew up without central heating so we're not bothered about not using it. We have a stove on in the lounge which runs on smokeless fuel. This is enough for the whole house as it's small and well insulated.

We only use gas to heat the water for showers and washing up. I keep the temperature down as much as is tolerable in the winter.

Ds1 has left home now so that's cut down on the computer usage. We don't have a tumble dryer and I hang washing on rails upstairs and they dry okay.

I don't know how much the bill will be because we pay as they come in. Just have to hope it's not too much.

Nothing I can do! I was stuck with a crappy pre pay company when I moved in here and I've been blocked from switching from them before anyway (long story)

My usage is as low as poss anyway I've not even had my ch on this winter

I use a space heater in the room I'm in sometimes but I generally run warm anyway (there's gotta be SOME benefits to pre meno!)

@Freecuthbert I had crappy storage heating in one place I lived and discovered halogen heaters. They heat up a room a treat and have a lovely cozy glow while on (you don't need to keep them on to keep a room heated they do seem to provide a long lasting heat too) and cost very little to run (or at least they did! I'm thinking still cheaper than expensive ch)

It's lighting I'm struggling with as I need good lighting for safe movement about the house (disabled) and I live in Scotland! So at the moment sunset around here is officially around 1630 but is actually around 1500 hrs!

Being disabled and on benefits myself but I'm doing ok as dd has left home now I'm most worried about poor people, pensioners and families inc those on benefits but especially those who are in that limbo of just starting to claim or work shifts and are subject to constant uc cock ups etc who are barely managing as it is!

If this had happened while I was still raising dd I'd be panicking at this point!

This is DISASTROUS for those in that position and I'm horrified that more people AREN'T horrified!

@Ashleighz88 the official prediction is 51% but some analysts are saying it may be as much as 60% and then there's gonna be ANOTHER hike in 6 months! And maybe another 6 months after that.

So roughly your electric will become AT LEAST £75 and gas £53

But I would say be prepared for it to be even more than that and also bear in mind another potential rise in 6 months and 12 months

There are also fewer places that are free and open and heated for people like @Dreamstate's neighbour to go. When I first split from ex - and at that time cm was deducted from benefits whether they paid it or not! - I was on bones of my arse! I used to spend days in my local library in order to stay warm without heating home. It was not fun! But now it's even worse with so many libraries and community centres etc closed due to the cuts!

I'll just be going to the office everyday now to keep costs down.

That's reminded me what I was reading that all other prices will likely go up too because of course businesses have to cover THEIR increased energy costs.

Up to this point (both on thread AND in msm news etc) nobody seems to have considered that factor! It's being discussed in some business and financial journals.

Following on from the impact of Covid now small businesses are likely to go under because of this.

Its infuriating that this govt aren't dealing with this effectively if at all! But then I suspect that's as many will have shares in the energy companies! Or their wives/parents/kids do

Incompetent corrupt pricks!

Well, I debated doing a few incantations and sacrificing a chicken to the Sun Gods in the hope of some good weather, but decided that was probably a little unkind, so made do with sacrificing some chickpeas to the bird table.

I'll be equally buggered if it's a warm spring and summer, though, as I cannot function in temperatures over about 21 Celsius. And that's before I've ever had a symptoms of perimenopause - something to do with EDS/POTS, apparently.

Other than that, it's more of the same in cooking - lots of wok use, low energy cooking (SC, rice cooker & steam basket) and probably a few more visits to the gym to use their hot water rather than my own.

I just don’t put the heating on, one of those who has to choose between heat and food. We have plenty of jumpers and blankets do we should be ok

@Graphista

Thank you for your suggestion about halogen heaters. We only have electric storage heaters here and they're not great, but they're provided by landlord so I haven't had to buy them. I'd actually been considering getting an oil heater as I'd heard those are very good. I think I'm going to have to do some research into all of this!

@Freecuthbert yes do some research into costs and efficacy etc

I'm not familiar with oil heaters so can't comment on them. I have a fan at the moment as I needed the cool function last summer! But I'm considering getting another halogen (last one died last winter but lasted 11 years so can't really complain!)

@BoPeeple

Price rises or not, I can’t believe the waste of energy on some of these posts

Heating on all night
Not drying washing outside
Computers on day and night

Am I the only one?

No, you're not the only one. See also multiple long showers and baths a day and washing clothes and towels after one use on the quick cycle which uses more energy and then tumble drying it all.

For some, energy has been too cheap so people don't care how much they use. It's very worrying for the people who are going to really struggle and hopefully there's going to be some help, but the other consequence of the price rises are that people are going to be less wasteful in their usage.

@BoPeeple I don’t have outside space to dry my laundry. I need heating on all night as am disabled and in chronic pain and awake most nights. Same with the laptop, it’s used as a radio/tv and keeps me company when I am in too much pain to sleep.

We wear fleece hoodies from Primark - £12 each.
Heating is on for 6 hours intermittently throughout the day.
I use a heated airer and double it up as the heater when I’m working from home - save the washing for those mornings. Everything that can be is turned off at the plug.

Only thing I have done is increase the DD payments. Not changed how we use energy, our usage is not excessive for how many of us there are in the house.

I’m hoping being able to work from my office again instead of from home will help a bit - heating won’t need to be on at all during the day, won’t have computer and monitors running all day, can use work microwave/kettle etc. for lunch and hot drinks, less hot water used washing up and washing hands, etc.

• Heating only on in rooms as needed
• leave oven open after cooking and make maximum use of flasks, batch cooking, slow cooker, rice cooker, Wonderbag (similar to old haybox)
• lots of layers of clothing including tights, base layers, socks, leggings, warm boots and lots of layers on top including scarf and hood and also appropriate fabrics, lots of natural fibres and fleece
• hot water bottles including old stone variety which stay warm for hours - we found one at our local hospice shop and others on ebay
• heavy lined curtains, bubble wrap and foil to reflect heat
• eating plenty of porridge, pasta and potatoes and drinking lots of tea and coffee and soup
• only buying what we really need this year, we have already cut back on treats

-working a second line of work for at least another 20 to 25 hours on top of full time job, I've forgotten what a weekend feels like as I'm always working

• eating a lot less meat (that one also due to climate change to be fair)

This is pretty much how I grew up in the bitterly cold north east and the fact that I'm here again in mid life is just one more reason for me to hate the government at least as much as they evidently hate the poor, old, disabled and otherwise dispossessed.

Ffs….recently moved into a flat from a house…costs us more to live here….thanks brexiteers and all who voted for the shit show that is Fucking Boris…🤬🤬🤬

-We also have the gadget mentioned above to check amount of electricity used by items

• we air dry everything and occasionally use the laundrette tumble dryer if say a uniform needs to be dried quickly, we don't have our own, or a dishwasher, and only a basic washer and fridge freezer
• we also have various battery powered items (rechargeable batteries) and try to keep power banks charged for phones etc
• due to stupid shared leasing limitations we can't install solar panels although a couple of the power banks are solar and I'll be investigating portable panels this year
• we have some wind up devices and if things get really bad we also have a kelly kettle (camping kit) and a portable barbecue
• our one power extravagance is the dehumidifiers but we find they make a huge difference to the temperature and help with clothes drying anyway, we don't need them so much in summer but we live in quite a damp part of the country at sea level
• we've also added motion sensors to the cat water fountain so it only runs when they approach

And we do have some financial slack though not very much, God only knows how those already struggling, or with young families or older or disabled family members are going to cope.

I find keeping doors closed to each room helps retain heat.

Often there is only me in the house so l will go in one room and use an electric heater. I'm hoping that is cheaper then heating the whole house which is empty.

I always have slippers, jumper etc on.

I have just tweaked my boiler settings. Heating comes on between 5 - 7.30am. As l get up at 6am and am dressed by 7am. It then comes on at 3.30pm till 7pm but I'm cooking also so I'll turn the thermostat down if l get too warm. I then get into bed at 7pm and watch TV.

Hot water doesn't come on till later in the morning as no-one has a shower first thing. I will shower on my days off after a run at about 10am. Thinking about it l could leave the hot water off completely in the morning and just click the override to heat it whilst I'm running and then turn it off again once done.

Hot water is on in the evening for the DC to shower after school.

I don't own a tumble dryer and my washing machine does a full wash in 45mins.

If anyone has any suggestions on what l do, please share.

Someone up-thread mentioned a chimney sheep - those things and great! We have however invested in blocking our chimney and removing the fireplace, and our house is so much warmer. But things like that are a big outlay if you don't have the money in the first place. And open plan living is a pain as you can't just heat one living space.

I'm always feeling chilly at cooler temperatures which my immediate family prefer (DH and kids are the kind of people who wear shorts in all weather outside). I've found, like others, leggings under jeans is warm without making me itch; a light cotton scarf indoors is very warming - more so than an extra jumper. Slippers, not just an extra pair of socks. Put on warm PJs and dressing gown, and snuggle under a duvet in the evening.

I've also found that wrapping up with many layers and going for a brisk 15 min walk in the daytime until I'm hot, makes even a cold house feel really warm for a few hours. This helps when I'm working at home.

When I read this thread I realise that we do still use a lot of energy unnecessarily in our house. I thought we were quite good, as we don't tumble dry, and we've cut down laundry. But the dishwasher goes on most days, and we run a second freezer, and we do have a night light on for my child at night. And now two of us are wfh, we use a lot of energy in the daytime. I need to improve

Our house is very cold and we're on LPG so it's already bloody expensive to have the house at a bearable low temperature.
Last year when we moved in we had a new heating system to replace the 2 the previous owner had. We had WiFi controllers put on most of the radiators so we can control them on our phones. I barely sleep so am constantly checking them throughout the night to make sure they don't come on in rooms were not in or turning them down. We're still flying through LPG though. We've had the gas fire removed and the gas cooker replaced with induction.
It's a renovation project so when we can afford it we will be re-insulating the loft, upgrading the radiators and replacing the drafty doors.

We need to cut back on electricity use too as it's way higher than we expected. We'll be changing all the lights as the ones prev owners left all have at least 6 bulbs in them. My DP has a habit of leaving lights on in this house as it's so dark inside (north facing) so he needs to start being more economical.

@BoPeeple

Price rises or not, I can’t believe the waste of energy on some of these posts

Heating on all night
Not drying washing outside
Computers on day and night

Am I the only one?

We have a baby, unlike adults and older children you can’t just put more clothes on them as you risk over heating, so your bedroom has to be a certain minimum temp. My husband also has a physical disability that makes it harder for his body to remain warm.

Not everyone has a garden.

Computers are fairly low use devices, mine costs around 1.2p per hour to charge.

[quote pregnantncnc]@driftcompatible - how warm are you keeping the house/their rooms? A room that is too warm is just as likely to cause overheating (and therefore cot death) as too many layers. I personally prefer a cooler room for my toddler (2yo) - although he still wears a sleeping bag so does stay in that, we are planning to buy one of the ones with feet from slumbersac when he outgrows the one he has now to keep him warm as I can't imagine him keeping a duvet on (for now he doesn't mind the bag). His room this evening when we put him to bed at 7.30pm was 16.5c, but it will drop overnight to 14ish in there or sometimes as low as 12 and if he wakes up cold (rare) he just comes into bed with us. He wears merino wool vest, cotton PJs (or wool ones - but we only have 1 pair) and a 2.5tog sleeping bag. We also have a 3.5tog sleeping bag for really cold nights.

We have our heating on 7.30am-9.30am, then 3.30-5.30pm. When it is really cold (as in, sticking around 0c or below all day) then I'll have the heating on all day, but that has only happened once where we live so far this year. We wear wool thermals under our clothes during the day if needed (toddler always wears a wool base layer as we are outside a lot).

As for keeping us adults warm; wool blanket under duvet at night, hot water bottles, PILs bought us Ooodies for christmas (a very large hoodie made of fleecy blanket material) which we wear in the evening - I find it warmer than my dressing gown as it is more enclosed. I also try to keep moving during the evening before I'm ready to go to bed; I do quite a bit of my cooking/cleaning/organising from 7.30pm-9.30pm ish, then head up to bed with my hot water bottles to watch TV until I want to read/sleep (which is usually within the hour haha).[/quote]
Maybe I'm being too precious with them tbh. I keep the room at a consistent 18 with the baby in the appropriate gro bag and the toddler in full pjs under a 4tog duvet. I could lower the temp but it gets SO cold here. Toddler may be waking up because she is used to 18 now

I think tonight I'll lower the temp to 14 and see what happens. It would be good to turn it off. I personally like a cooler room anyway.

I also have two log burners that will heat the whole house quickly and well BUT I feel guilty about using them because so many have said they are bad for people and the environment. But it would save me a LOT of money. If I used the burners I wouldn't ever need heating on at all.